In this testimonial interview, Neville Wynn, a compliant property sourcer operating in the Leeds region, explains how he previously struggled with a fragmented, time‑consuming workflow that required juggling multiple platforms (Rightmove, Zoopla, auction sites), a CRM, spreadsheets, and assorted apps to track investors, properties, and refurb projects. The lack of integration forced him to spend 7‑10 hours per week on sourcing alone, amounting to roughly 400‑500 hours over a year. After trialling the Propertyfilter platform, he highlights three core features that transformed his business: (1) customisable pipelines/funnels that let him stage offers, follow‑ups, and viewings, dramatically reducing manual tracking; (2) comprehensive price‑history graphs and access to comparables, land‑registry data, and area rent metrics, enabling him to identify motivated sellers and avoid overpaying; and (3) a supportive community where peers share questions and advice, alleviating the isolation of solo sourcing. These tools have allowed him to consistently source about two buy‑to‑let deals per month, save up to 10 hours weekly, and maintain a reliable income stream while keeping costs low (≈£100/month subscription). The interview underscores the value of integrated data, workflow automation, and community support for independent property sourcers.
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I just created this other job where I was just there at my desk going, taking ages, saving maybe 6, 7, 8, 10 hours a week, maybe times 4, 40 times this last year. You know, so that's, what's that, 400, nearly 500 hours. So my name is Neville Wynn. I'm based in the Leeds region, just outside Leeds. I'm a compliant property sourcer, so I help people outside the area, mainly sort of Southeast based, some overseas. To find or comfortably invest in buy-to-lets in the region, the Leeds region. I think really, well, to be able to kind of provide this service consistently, to provide a good service, there are sort of 3 main parts. One is finding investors, attract investors. Second is finding sort of properties. And then the third thing is preparing the properties. So, and it sounds simple, but when you're kind of spinning these 3 different plates at the same time, it can get quite challenging. So what's really important is that I'm able to sort of, to provide this service, a consistently good service, I need to be able to keep track of all these different 3 parts. But when it came to finding the properties, I was just all over the place. So I was dipping out of the different platforms, the property platforms, Rightmove, Zoopla on the market, auction sites, Rightmove sold prices. I had a CRM to sort of keep details of the vendors and the agents. I had a spreadsheet to sort of track conversations and links to properties, extra apps to see sort of price, you know, track price history. So it was all over the place. And when you're doing these other two things at the same time, it was just quite overwhelming to kind of maintain all this and to do it consistently on a sort of day-to-day basis. That was the biggest challenge really, just being able to do all of this by myself initially. It was just taking ages. That was the biggest hurdle really to overcome. And I came into property, so I've been in that property for years in the background working another job, but I wanted to get out of that previous role, that previous job to create more time for myself, for me and my family. And just, I like getting outdoors, I like spending time with family, and I just found myself, I just created this other job where I was just there at my desk going, taking ages to kind of to to find these properties, to value them, to submit offers, to follow up. The whole process was taking too long. So I was looking for a way of just some way of kind of streamlining that process to make it more manageable so that I could just spend literally an hour or two each day on that side of the business, knowing that I was kind of getting plenty done but without having to put too much effort into it, without having to employ, you know, staff. I've got VAs that help, but I didn't want to have to spend too much time and effort on that side of the business. So I was looking for a sort of quicker more streamlined solution. It was just a no-brainer in the end. I did the trial. I saw how well it worked. And there's certain features which I don't know if you can ask me about later, but certain features which I found really useful just to make things easier. So, you know, it depends how much you value your time, how much you want to charge. I bill myself per hour, but £100 a month is not a massive amount in the grand scheme of things because, you know, it's making me money and it's saving me time, which in turn is, you know, and there's money, isn't it? So it's just seeing a sort of way out of this almost chaos. So it was actually seeing, 'cause you can set up this funnel, you can create your own funnel within Property Builder, and just be able to see things at different stages in the funnel and tracking the progress of each offer that was submitted, things which had sort of seen which fitted our investors' criteria within that pipeline. So just feeling more organised really, and a bit more manageable.
[Speaker] And if I was to ask you, I guess, what your top 3 favourite features are and maybe why that is, Yeah. Do you mind kind of discussing that?
Yeah. So the two you mentioned, the pipelines, the fact is you can create your own funnel. You can create the stages in the funnel. So I have, again, to save time, rather than going to view everything I see, I'll submit an offer subject to viewing. So I'll speak to the agent over the phone or by email. I'll submit an offer of what I think it's worth. Only if they accept or if they kind of, they hint they'll accept, will I then go and view the property. So my first stage is interest, submit an offer, follow up. If it's accepted, then go and view it. And then they're kind of staged in the pipeline. You can create those stages. So when I find a property that's suitable in Propertyfilter, I add it to the pipeline, it just, and then it eventually moves up that pipeline. That's one thing. Second thing is, like you say, the price history. So you can clearly see there's a clear graph of how long property's been on for, when it's come off, when it's sold, such as the contract, when there's been a price drop. And quite often, so you might see on Rightmove that maybe it came on last month, but actually when you look on Propertyfilter, you can see it was on with a different agent. 18 months prior to that. So you get more insights, more information. All the messengers expect the same thing, which is not what we're offering. But certainly we've got one that was, it was on the market for like £160,000 and after being able to track the kind of price history and came back on the market again, it went off again, came back on again, again, looking at this price history within Propertyfilter. I think having the access to the comparables and area data. So just a quick overview of rents, how long it takes to rent. So you get an idea of the demand in the area. Comparables, you can quickly see things which have sold recently. Sometimes they have stuff on Land Registry on here which you can't find, you don't see on Rightmove. I'm not sure why, but you seem to sometimes see things on here you can't see just on Rightmove sold prices. So yeah, that's access to the data as well within, so when you pull up that property within that tab for that property, I've got it set up so that I'm looking at properties. Well, one of the things I do is look at properties that have been in the market for about over 90 days, had a recent price drop, or they've come back on the market again recently. So I know the vendor's a bit more motivated. So it helps me to kind of sort of reach that, the sort of what it's really worth. 'Cause sometimes they've gone on the market and they're way off and you think, oh, can I be bothered to, you know, sort of try and get them down? But after 2, 3 months, they're a bit more, I guess, realistic in the price expectations. So I'm, with the help of Propertyfilter, I'm able to kind of identify those vendors more quickly. So it just means I'm finding properties, not overpaying, paying a fair price more consistently and doing it in a more kind of organised way as well. So on average it works out about 2 a month at the moment, and that's, to be honest, I'm quite happy with that. So that's the first thing, is providing me with a good, solid, consistent income on this side of my business, my kind of property journey. And secondly, so consistently finding properties which are, you know, asking price is different to what it's worth, but we're very rarely getting caught out because of information, the data we can find within Propertyfilter. We're able to, well, first of all value it, once you get speaking to the agent, the vendor, understand the situation. So we're just paying, like I say, we're paying quite, from quite a bit below asking price, but it's what it's worth. We're not being caught out. We just have the information there in front of us to do that easily, more consistently. But certainly we've got one that was, it was on the market for like £160,000 and after being able to track the kind of price history and came back on the market again, it went off again, came back on again, again, looking at the price history within Propertyfilter. And then we paid £118,000. We're doing a refurb, about £45,000 and it's it's going to— we expect next door, one sold for £200,000, which is kind of a bit dated. So we're expecting very conservative £200,000 in this kind of current market. We're expecting more. So that's a pretty decent deal considering I'm not looking for those things at the moment. Again, because I need consistency and I don't want to kill myself or leave investors waiting for months and months. They just want to get things going now. But that was pretty good. Easy, well, per week saving maybe 7, 8, 10 hours a week maybe, times 4, 40, times this last year, you know, so that's, what's that, 400, nearly 500 hours, which is how many months? A lot of months.
Well, I don't know how many months, but yeah, good.
I did dodgy maths then, but yeah, it saved me a lot because like I say, it was just an hour at a time, you know, because I'm already doing the investor side and the refurb side, and that's kind of more manageable within what I was using, what I'm using for that. But this was just, there were just so many dipping in and out of different tools and software and apps and things. So just having it all there in front of me, I can see it now, it just looks so organised and nice. I think you mentioned before about the community and the support. That was a big thing for me, certainly at first, because you know, you start out, you just, you feel, you can feel it can be quite lonely. You know, I'm doing this by myself. I've got, obviously got really good connections with my sort of team. So sisters, brokers, the trades, the VAs that help out, but still, it's still me doing this. Am I going to have to sort of manage these people or work with these people? So within the community, there are lots of people in similar positions, and you know, it's really quite friendly and open. It's easy to kind of ask questions and not feel stupid, and you see all sorts of questions. And even just seeing like sort of very, I guess, like beginner questions, it feels good to think you've progressed so far in such a short space of time. So I think community was a really big, big help.
